Nationality and Borders Bill

Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 8th February 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Stroud (Con)]

My Lords, I too support Amendment 100, in the name of my noble friend Lord Kirkhope, to which I have been pleased to add my name. I refer to my entry in the register of Members’ interests.

The question of offshore detention is undoubtedly one of the most controversial aspects of this Bill, which is designed to stem the flow of small boats from France. The stated objective of this policy is one of deterrence, but opponents of the policy have rightly been asking: at what cost?

Before we look at the issue of offshoring, I will take a moment to look at and think about the sorts of journeys taken by those fleeing violence and war. Asylum seekers are frequently exposed to intolerable levels of risk as they travel. Irregular migrants face dangerous journeys: they are unprotected, they accumulate debt, and they have no legal recourse. The limited opportunities for legal migration force individuals to use people smugglers where there is a risk of being trafficked. Asylum seekers who fall prey to human traffickers can be exploited in both transit and destination countries. During the asylum seeker’s journey, the fine line with human trafficking—the acquisition of people by force, fraud or deception with the aim of exploiting them—can be easily crossed.

Just imagine you go through all that and end up on these shores. It has taken your savings and months of your life to arrive here from, say, Afghanistan, Syria or Iran. On arrival on our shores, we greet you and, before we have even assessed whether or not you are a refugee, put you on a plane and take you back to the continent from which you came. That action alone could kill someone, but my question is also: what does that make us?

Before I set out my reason for asking the Home Secretary to think again about the use of offshore detention and processing, whether in Rwanda, Ghana or Ascension Island, as we have heard, I will return to the point I made last Tuesday. The best hope of a fair, just and affordable solution to the issue of the Calais boats still lies with a diplomatic solution with the French and EU nations. Will my noble friend the Minister comment on the Telegraph story on Wednesday about the French President’s apparent openness to a deal over channel crossings? As I have suggested a number of times, a returns agreement with the French is likely to be the only viable way to stop the crossings. I imagine this taking the form of an agreement that those who have crossed here irregularly are sent back to be assessed in France; in return, we commit to taking a certain number from Calais. This is a win-win solution that would genuinely destroy the economic model of the people smugglers, would cost less and would be far more humane.

Could my noble friend the Minister also provide an estimate of the cost of offshore processing? A cursory glance shows that a room at the Ritz costs between £650 and £700 a night. Extrapolate that and one finds that it costs around £250,000 to stay at the Ritz for a year. The estimates of what the Australians pay for one asylum seeker held in detention vary from that amount to eight times that. How can that be justified?

It is not only the cost that concerns me. Can the Minister provide reassurance that no children will be sent offshore and that women who are vulnerable to sexual violence will receive proper protections? The concerning stories that emerge from processing camps in other countries should give us pause for thought before we embark down this road. When there are other potential diplomatic avenues that the Government are yet to properly consider, offshoring looks like an oversized hammer being used to crack a nut, with the potential for corrupting our character as a nation and our international reputation, and increasing racial tensions domestically and the administrative burden and cost to the state. I urge the Minister to think again and for this House to give the other place an opportunity to think again.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

Outside on the streets today are people supporting those of us who are fighting this Bill. They understand the damage it does not only to the refugees and people seeking asylum here but to the Government’s reputation. I do wonder. We have to say these things, because our consciences would not let us not say them, but are the Government listening? I rather think not. Essentially, these clauses are about being able to deport refugees while their asylum claim is being processed. That is not fair on the individuals involved and, I would argue, is inhumane. They are simply being herded like cattle and packed off to be trafficked, essentially.

Clause 28 and Schedule 3 make provision for safe countries, but no provision for safe accommodation. We know that the accommodation we provide here in the UK is pretty substandard and, sometimes, outright revolting, so I have no trust that safe countries will do any better than we have. I have a question that I would like answered today: what steps will the Government take to assess the conditions and that these people are being treated well in those safe countries?

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[Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood (CB)]

My Lords, I shall continue to limit my interventions in Committee to expressing views that I hold simply as a lawyer. The course I took on Tuesday of last week, when we were discussing Clause 11, gave us an early introduction to the very provisions with regard to reinterpreting the convention that we are now concerned with. I reserve the right, when we come to Report, to come in on what I regard as the more obviously mean-spirited and ill-judged other provisions, which are, as is patent, designed to deter as many as possible of those who would otherwise wish to seek refugee status in this country.

Clause 29, as has already been pointed out, is an omnibus provision that takes you into further and more specific, and therefore more specifically objectionable, provisions, which take the convention apart and reinterpret it piece by piece. As both noble Baronesses have said, that is itself intrinsically an objectionable way to proceed with regard to one’s legal obligations.

There are three further stand part notices in this group. I will not touch on all of them because time is the enemy today, as it will be on Thursday. On Clause 33, the protection from persecution, as the Bingham Centre for the Rule of Law has valuably pointed out, this clause fundamentally changes the approach to protection from persecution from a focus on meaningful and effective protection against persecution, which our long-established jurisdiction establishes is the correct focus, to a focus on the existence of a reasonable system to prevent, investigate and prosecute instances of where, despite the system, there has been persecution. This refocusing mischievously—and, I suggest, in legal terms, fatally—sidesteps the all-important question of whether the system is likely to protect the individual concerned.

In the interests of time, rather than make comparatively lesser points on the other two named clauses, Clauses 34 and 35, I will pass on. I say only on Clause 35, mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, that this is directed to Article 1(F) of the convention. Clause 35(2) goes to Article 1(F)(b), concerning serious non-political crimes, and we will come in the next group to Clause 37, which deals with Article 33 of the convention on non-refoulement. Whatever the position on non-refoulement that may be arrived at under the refugee convention, even if, for example, the asylum seeker was found to be a war criminal and so is denied refugee status under Article 1(F)(a) of the convention—see Clause 35(1) of the Bill—it still is not possible to return that person to their country of origin if they would be persecuted. That is simply precluded by Article 3 of the ECHR.

I have had a helpful exchange of emails with the Bill manager. I asked the Minister at our Cross-Bench meeting a question which he referred to the Bill manager; namely, whether any of these provisions in the Bill were intended or calculated to alter any of the well-established and authoritative case law in this country. Except for one point which the Bill manager made regarding Clause 37, which corrects an ambiguity that arose under Section 72 of the 2002 Act, I am unpersuaded that where there is a departure from our case law, as is recognised, it is properly made under this Bill. I finish at this point.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

My Lords, I have been here for only eight years, which is not long in your Lordships’ House, but I have never seen so many attempts to delete clauses from a Bill—and of course that is completely the right thing to do here. With this Government, I always look for dead cats being thrown on the table to distract us from something much worse that is happening under the table, but there are so many dead cats in this Bill that I am assuming they are all genuine bits of the Bill that the Government want to pass, which is quite disturbing.

Here the Government are trying to unilaterally rewrite international law, and they are doing so to appease the far right, both in their party and in the country. That is a pointless thing to do; you will never appease the far right. It is an example of the Government throwing away decades of international progress on domestic and international policies only to appease a segment of society who are outspoken and noisy—like the Greens, I suppose, but, unlike the Greens, they actually have malign intent.

We are sending a signal to the world that we are not competent to run our country any more, and certainly not worthy of being part of any international grouping that believes in progress and the rights of the human being.

[Lord Alton of Liverpool (CB)]

My Lords, I add my voice to those of the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, my noble and learned friend Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood, and the noble Baronesses, Lady Hamwee and Lady Chakrabarti, in saying to the Minister, for whom I have considerable respect—I know of his own track record in the area of international law and the upholding of human rights—that beyond the legal arguments that have already been put to him is the reputational damage to this country, not least because of international issues, some of which he will be aware of.

Anything that we do to dilute our commitment to the 1951 convention on the treatment of refugees—any unravelling or unscrambling of our commitments—is to be deplored. I will give two examples to the Minister. I co-chair the All-Party Parliamentary Group on North Korea and am vice-chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Uyghurs. In the case of North Korea, we, the United Kingdom, will regularly raise with the People’s Republic of China the refoulement policy of sending North Koreans from the PRC, to which they have escaped, back to North Korea, knowing that terrible things, including executions, will happen to them when they are sent back—a clear dereliction of the commitment to which the PRC signed up in the 1951 convention on the treatment of refugees.

In the case of Uighurs, Turkey is presently considering sending back Uighurs because of an agreement that it has reached with the People’s Republic of China. Everyone in your Lordships’ House—notably the noble Lord, Lord Anderson of Ipswich, who is in his place; he raised this issue with me as recently as last week, in another debate—is well aware that there are 1 million Uighurs in detention centres and camps in Xinjiang, and we know of terrible atrocities that have occurred. Our own Foreign Secretary has said that a genocide is under way. In that context, for any country, and in the case of Turkey a NATO country, to be sending people back, again in violation of its duties in the 1951 convention, seems to be deplorable. However, the United Kingdom can hardly start lecturing others not to do these things if we ourselves are going to unscramble and diminish the importance of the 1951 convention.

I suppose that, as a post-war baby, I have maybe too much admiration for what was not entirely a golden age, but think about all the things that were put in place at that time: everything from the Marshall aid programme to the 1948 Universal Declaration on Human Rights, with its 30 articles that set out our rights on an international basis, and the 1948 convention on the crime of genocide. Given all those things that have been put in place, we should think extraordinarily carefully before we do anything to diminish or dilute them. That is why I hope the Minister will give proper consideration to the interventions that he has heard so far—I am sure he will—and, between now and Report, see what more we can do to ensure that we do nothing to diminish the importance of the 1951 convention.

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[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Ministry of Justice (Lord Wolfson of Tredegar) (Con)]

My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords who have taken part in this debate.

The starting point is that we are no longer members of the European Union and, by extension, the Common European Asylum System. In response to the point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, these provisions are not a direct response to the case of AH (Algeria). They are about having an opportunity to define clearly and unscramble refugee convention terms following our exit from the EU. It is right that, at this time of legal change, we take the opportunity to reassess the operation of our asylum system and reconsider our approach not only to fundamental policies but to processes, so that we can create a clearer and more accessible system.

The fact is that the development of the asylum system through international conventions, European law, domestic legislation, Immigration Rules and case law has created a complex legal web that can be difficult to understand and apply; that goes for claimants, decision-makers and the courts. I do not propose to use props—I understand that that is not permitted—but, for my own assistance on a later group, I brought a book called, rather laughingly, The Immigration Law Handbook. We consider it a desirable law reform to define clearly key elements of the refugee convention in UK domestic law. In response to my noble friend Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts, that is exactly what we are doing. We want to make the position clearer for everyone, including decision-makers and the courts.

A lot has been said that touches on the same point but, with great respect, the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, perhaps put it most forcefully. She used a number of metaphors. Let me respond to them. This is not about tripping anybody up. It is not a sleight of hand; it is difficult to do one of those on the Floor of your Lordships’ House. This is about bringing clear definitions before Parliament and having them all in one place. The central point is this: there is nothing wrong—indeed, I suggest that there is everything right—with the UK, through this Parliament, interpreting its obligations under the refugee convention. That is entirely lawful. I use “lawful” in both its narrow and wide senses. It is lawful in the sense that it is in accordance with the law; it is also lawful in the broader sense of being in accordance with the political or constitutional principle that we call the rule of law. Further, it is in accordance with the Vienna convention. Everything we are doing complies fully with all our international obligations, including the refugee convention and the European Convention on Human Rights. I will come back to the question that the noble Baroness asked me in that regard a little later.

With respect to the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, it is not perverse to use domestic legislation to give effect to and interpret international treaties. I assure the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, that I am not in the business of appeasing the far right; nor am I in the business of deleting obligations under international law. Many of the definitions, which repay careful reading, are very similar to those already used in the UK—for example, those contained in the 2004 qualification directive, which was transposed into UK law via the 2006 regulations.

I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Alton, for his kind words. I assure him that I of course give proper consideration to international reputational impacts, but surely there can be no adverse impact by complying with international law and interpreting treaties in accordance with the Vienna convention.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

I am sorry, I missed my moment; I should have spoken as soon as the Minister spoke to me. I did not accuse him of trying to appease the far right. I hope I did not say that—I certainly did not mean to—but I do accuse the Government of it. I know that the Minister did not write this Bill, but that is something I see the Government as guilty of.

[Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)]

I did not take it personally. I agree that I did not write the Bill. It would be a far worse Bill, and the noble Baroness would like it even less, if I had written it. But I replied in that way because I take the view that if I am standing here defending government policy, then I will stand here and defend government policy. I certainly would not defend a government policy which was simply appeasing the far right. So, that is why I replied in those terms. I know that the noble Baroness was not making a personal attack; I did not take it that way.

To finish my point to the noble Lord, Lord Alton—

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[Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood (CB)]

I will address Clause 36 very briefly, which I discussed last week in the context of Clause 11. I confine myself today to asking two questions.

First, do the Government accept, as I suggest they must, that Clause 36 would overrule the judgments of Lord Bingham and, among others, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope of Craighead, in Asfaw, fully affirming what had been said on the relevant issues in the judgment I gave in the Divisional Court in Adimi? This has all been elaborated on today by my noble and learned friend, Lord Etherton.

Secondly, if so, are the Government overturning Asfaw and Adimi because, disinterestedly, they genuinely think those decisions are clearly wrong—or because they think an alternative and more anti-asylum seeker interpretation may arguably be available to them?

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

The idea of people being able to arrive here without going through a third country has been debated before in the course of this Bill—I cannot remember whether it was last week or another time. When we queried how people could get here, the Minister explained that they could come by aeroplane. That might be possible for some, but it is not possible for everyone who might need to be here in Britain rather than somewhere in Germany or France. Perhaps the Minister could give us a better explanation about how people get here, if there are not enough safe routes or aeroplanes.

To me, this is a naked attempt to stop refugees. I do not understand why the Government cannot see this as well. We are taking advantage of our geography and saying, “We’re too far away, you can’t come”. This is ridiculous. As I have pointed out before, we have a moral duty to many of these people. We have disrupted their politics, their climate and their lives—therefore, we owe them. It is not as simple as saying that they want to join their mates.

This Bill should be setting out safe routes and establishing ways to get people to the UK safely and legally. At the moment, we do not have that because the Government are pulling up the drawbridge.

[Lord Green of Deddington (CB)]

My Lords, in a word, I see these issues from a policy point of view, not just a legal one. The fact is that our asylum system is in chaos, and very visibly so. Large numbers of claimants are turning up on our beaches. The Government are seeking to tighten the asylum system. That does not seem to be unreasonable, and I very much agree with the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson.

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[Lord Hylton (CB)]

My Lords, I have added my name to three amendments in this group. I note that they are all new clauses. New clauses are necessary to improve this Bill, and they are essential to humanising our present systems, let alone what may emerge from the Bill once it becomes an Act.

Reuniting families split by wars and persecution brings huge benefits; I think we can all agree on that. Amendment 112 enfranchises both children and their parents. It also empowers the Secretary of State to add new kinds of relationships. Amendment 113 should, as the noble Baroness, Lady Ludford, has just mentioned, reduce dangerous crossings of the channel.

On Amendment 114, we all know that the neighbours of Syria and Iraq have been subjected to and have accepted huge influxes of people. The same is also true of southern European states. For these reasons, there is an urgent need for equitable burden sharing. This, in turn, will require much greater international co-operation. We can do our part in this country by using family reunion. Our neighbours and allies are entitled to know what our intentions and proposals are in this respect.

The wording of all three amendments can, I expect, be improved. Will the Government accept at least their principles, take them away and bring them back in pristine condition?

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

Going through the amendments this morning in preparation for this evening, I got quite tearful when I read these amendments because my family is incredibly important to me—every single one of them. I love them and I do not want to lose them or break up in any way from them. The thought that we in Britain could be the cause of families separating made me very upset.

I have signed two of these amendments, but they are all good amendments. The Government really ought to look into their own hearts and think about how they would feel if their families were broken up, through no fault of their own, because of despotic powers or other reasons. It is time to be a little bit kinder in this Bill, so please will the Government accept these amendments?

[The Lord Bishop of Durham]

My Lords, I specifically support Amendment 117, to which I have added my name, but I support all these amendments around family reunion. I declare my interests in the register around RAMP and Reset as before.

Acknowledging that when people are forcibly displaced they end up in different places, often having lost family members, UNHCR research has shown that families often set out together but become separated along the way. Reconnecting those families, or, where some family members are lost, reconnecting people with other relatives, really matters. In seeking protection, those seeking asylum want to do so alongside the family that they have. This is better for individuals—their well-being and their future prospects—and for the community as a whole. It is therefore also better for social integration.

In my conversations with refugees and people seeking asylum, the whereabouts and safety of family is generally the number one preoccupation that they raise. This concern overrides everything. When we speak about family, it is not purely spouses and children but aunts, uncles, cousins, nephews and nieces. Organisations working with refugees, such as Safe Passage, know from their work that, when people have no safe route to reach their families, they are more likely to risk their lives on dangerous journeys to reach loved ones. Many of these individuals are children and young people seeking to reunite, often with their closest surviving relatives.

No doubt the Minister will give us the numbers again of how many families have been reunited under it, but existing refugee family reunion is narrow in scope. The threshold to be met under paragraphs 297 and 319X of the Immigration Rules for an adult non-parent to reunite with a child is “serious and compelling circumstances”, which is extremely difficult to meet in practice.

I appreciate that we cannot offer protection to all extended family members, but we can do this for some out of kindness, and it would divert them from using criminal gangs. Once they arrived in the UK, they would enter the asylum system to have their claim for protection decided.

Of course, we would prefer people not to have to make the dangerous journeys as far as Europe, and I expect that the Minister will cite pull factors to Europe as a rebuttal. With an ambitious resettlement scheme—which we will come back to—a broader definition for family reunion, as well as an increasing commitment to aid and constructive engagement with our near neighbours, I believe that any such pull factor to one safe route will be mitigated. The alternative is that people come anyway but in an unplanned way, risking their lives and causing further trauma.

I urge the Minister to at last give way on one item: consider this proposal as a pragmatic response to the need to find durable solutions for desperate people dying on our borders in order to reach their family.

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[Baroness Hamwee (LD)]

My Lords, I am sure this was not at the top of his list, but the noble Lord, Lord Alton, has reminded us of the role of the arts in this area. Artists, playwrights and others could express better than the rest of us what they feel, and audiences could perhaps get a wider and deeper understanding of the issues involved. The area of arts and culture is hugely important in this.

Earlier this evening the noble Lord, Lord Wolfson, said that we will continue to grant humanitarian protection, and Amendment 118 seeks to extend that to a humanitarian visa. I will explain it as quickly as I can, because what is most important is that we hear what the Minister has to say. If it is a “Sorry, no”, we need to understand why. I express my gratitude to Garden Court Chambers for drafting this amendment, which spells out the requirements and the process.

The amendment seeks to provide an exceptional route by which a person abroad—not in this country—can obtain a visa to come to the UK to seek asylum. At the moment, it is generally not possible to claim asylum in the UK unless one is already here. This visa could be applied for from anywhere in the world. The person would have to show that, if made in the UK, the claim

“would have a realistic prospect of success”,

and also that

“there are serious and compelling reasons why”

it should be considered in the UK. In assessing that, the entry clearance officer would take into account the extent of the risk of persecution or serious harm—persecution having the meaning that it has in the UN refugee convention, and serious harm meaning treatment that, if it occurred in the UK, would be contrary to Article 2, the right to life, or Article 3, the prohibition of torture and inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, of the European Convention on Human Rights.

If a humanitarian visa is granted, the person will be granted a visa—I stress that—of at least six months’ duration. The Home Secretary could set conditions such as restricting access to work. On coming to the UK, the person will be deemed to have made an asylum claim and will go through the normal asylum process like any other asylum seeker, so the normal processes would not be sidestepped. There would be a full right of appeal, which is Amendment 119.

I have written down the words “Controlled and organised process”. Those working in the sector have long advocated humanitarian visas, which would be one of a suite of safe and legal routes. The humanitarian visa route would not be something that many could take advantage of, but it is significant and structured.

I will leave that there; as I say, the Minister’s response is more important tonight. However, on Amendment 119A, I will say that I was not surprised to see it. The noble Baroness, Lady Kennedy, never misses an opportunity to buttonhole someone who might assist the women judges, other lawyers and others in Afghanistan. What she is seeking is only temporary, in the same way as a humanitarian visa would be. It is one thing to get people out of the country when they are at risk—she has had the most extraordinary success—but it is another to find somewhere for them to go.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

I will not repeat myself—well, I am going to repeat myself just briefly. If the Government saw refugees as human beings, they would already have written these amendments into the Bill. We are pushing at a closed door at the moment. We should be taking more refugees and creating more safe routes.

I have a word of warning, which is that there will be many climate—ecological—emergencies over the next decade or so and, given that we have contributed a large part of the world’s accumulated CO₂ emissions, we have to understand that we have a moral duty to take our share of climate refugees. It is already happening. There are parts of Africa that are now almost uninhabitable because of climate change, and other places will shortly follow. We have to understand that refugees are not a temporary problem but a permanent problem, and there will be a lot more. If we prepare well and put the programmes and the funding in place, we can cope and do it well. However, while the Government treat refugees as criminals and unwanted people, I am afraid that I see this simply as another reason why the Government have to go.

[Lord Kerr of Kinlochard (CB)]

I think the noble Baroness’s warning is very well taken.

I support Amendments 118, 119A and 119B, but I want particularly to speak in favour of Amendment 116 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Kirkhope. The noble Lord and I have done business together for a long time—the past is another country, and it was in fact in another country—and it is a pleasure to be supporting his amendment. I should also say that I am very grateful to the Minister for the letter that she wrote to the noble Lord, Lord Dubs, with a number of useful factual points in it. I am very grateful for my copy today.

It seems to me that the amendment raises two questions: why should one set a number, and why 10,000? Why should one set a number? I am a trustee of the Refugee Council and I have spent some time trying to work out why so many of the Afghan refugees who came here last summer are still in temporary bridging accommodation. I have not quite got to the bottom of it, but it seems to me that the problem is not ill will or lack of intention. I do not criticise the Government. It is a problem with local authorities that arises from the squeeze on their budgets and lack of certainty over financing. The attraction of setting a minimum number is the certainty of having a number in the public expenditure survey—a number negotiated with the Treasury. The Treasury would need to ensure that local authorities were equipped with the money to pay for at least that level.

There seems to be no shortage of willingness in local authorities; it is a shortage of funding in local authorities. When you look at the huge number of local authorities—nearly 300—which came in under the Syrian refugee scheme, it seems to me that what is needed is the certainty that enables one to plan ahead for financing and finding accommodation. So I think setting a number is a good idea and I support the noble Lord, Lord Kirkhope, for that reason.

Is 10,000 the right number? There are 28 million refugees in the world; it does not seem a very high number. Canada is taking 35,000 Afghans in this calendar year. The population of Canada is just over half the population of the United Kingdom. Comparing us with Europeans, we are number 21 out of 42—bang in the middle of the pack. With our tradition of a presence around the world, that seems to be quite low.

On the other hand, it is probably more than the hotchpotch of present schemes will bring in. It probably would be an increase, but I cannot say for sure because, as the Minister says in the enclosure to her letter today, rather surprisingly, 11 months in, it is still too soon to produce any statistics on how many people are coming in under the resettlement scheme that started in March last year. We do not know how many we are taking now, so we do not know whether this would be an increase. I suspect it would be, but I suspect that overall refugee numbers coming to this country would drop over time. I think this is the answer to the channel problem; 26,000 people came across the channel last year. If there were safe routes—and here is a safe, reliable route—fewer people would try to come unofficially. Fewer people would get killed trying to come into the country.

So I think that, although the number of official refugees would probably go up if we set a 10,000 minimum, the total number of refugees coming here would probably go down. I cannot prove it but that is my instinct. It seems to me that so strong is the incentive to find safe routes that this is a very good way of going about it, so I support the amendment.

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[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)]

It is genuinely not the noble Baroness, but we also need to work together —please—to get this Bill through. It is an important Bill. All noble Lords absolutely have the right to say what they want, but we also need to get this through. I am sorry, but can we please focus on that? We will let everyone speak, but please be aware of the time and what everyone else needs to be doing tonight.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

Why do we need to get the Bill through? Why can we not leave it until after the recess? I do not understand. This is the Government’s problem—they have created this problem for us.

[Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)]

The intervention was on me—